8 June 2012

Long morning, Einar warming slowly and Liz at times not at all sure in which direction he might be headed, wishing very badly that they might have a fire to speed up the process just a bit, but she knew better than to try it, just yet.  The two of them had agreed on the wisdom of waiting for a time after the departure of the helicopter to resume having fires, and though it seemed to her unlikely the rescuers would have any business at all returning so long after their initial visit to the basin, she went on waiting to rekindle the blaze out of consideration for Einar; that chopper would still be very fresh in his mind, and there seemed no sense in having a fire to warm the place if he wouldn’t be there to benefit from it, which she doubted he would be.  So, the fire could wait.  She was herself having little trouble staying comfortably warm and Will was even better off, spending all of his time either held close to her or snuggled beneath the furs of two or three different species of high-altitude mammal, so all things considered, there was no pressing need to heat the place up prematurely.

Three more pots of water she heated for Einar’s hands, knowing from past experience with his feet and, to a lesser degree, with her own hands a time or two, that it was a mistake to end the thawing process before the water had been allowed time to do a thorough job, and by that fifth and final bowl, the pain finally seemed to be subsiding some for him, and she was glad.  Had offered him willow bark to chew, had even made a tea of the stuff for him to drink but he’d refused, and she had not been sure whether the refusal stemmed from an uncertainty on his part just what it was she was offering, despite her explanations, or whether he really did desire to go through the thawing without anything to dull its impact, but she strongly suspected the second, as he wouldn’t even allow her to add willow tea to the soaking water.  Which would have helped some.  So she let him be, seeing by the stark clarity in his eyes as he watched her pour that last pot of water the benefit he was likely deriving from the process and wishing with a terrible strength that there might be some other way, any other way at all to achieve the same end for him.  No matter.  Not just then,  It was a matter for another time, and she would give it some thought, but for the moment, he had to have his hands thawed anyway, and she was just glad it was nearly over.

Rummaging through their supply of medicinals, she pulled out a quantity of the cottonwood bud “balm of Gilead” salve she had carefully conserved and carried on their travels, and which had been such a help to her in the past with minor frostbite.  They were nearly out of the stuff, would be needing to make a fresh batch that spring, provided she could get down to the river valley in time to collect the still-closed leaf buds of a cottonwood or two, orange, resinous and sweet-smelling with the gummy substance that proved such strong medicine against burns, minor infection and skin conditions of all types.  They were best collected in the late winter or early spring, before the leaves started pushing their way through and warmer days turned the resin to a sticky, difficult-to-handle mess, and she supposed she could do some collecting when they went down to the river for their beaver and muskrat trapping, if they still ended up making that trip.  In the meantime, she warmed some of the precious salve in her hand and carefully spread it on Einar’s reddened and now-blistering fingers, focusing on the areas which seemed to have seen the worse of the damage and pausing to look him in the eye when he made no reaction at all to her ministrations, concerned that he must be about to lose consciousness but finding him clearly wide awake and seeing in his eyes only a calm, steady stare that she had come to know well in him, and she continued, treating, bandaging, glad when the job was finished and she could finally work on getting him really warm, without worrying about keeping pots of water from spilling in the process.

Einar didn’t seem particularly interested in getting warm, sat there instead carefully flexing his hands, testing their movement and seeing just what he might expect to be able to do with them, should circumstances suddenly demand.  Not a whole lot.  It was discouraging.  If he’d been clumsy before, hungry and hypothermic and frequently trembling as his body made an unconscious effort to generate a little heat--he had hated it, the loss of his dexterity that winter, counting it perhaps the most aggravating consequence of the chronic near-starvation which he had imposed upon himself--he was doubly so now, with three of his fingers and his left thumb wrapped thickly with gauze and several other fingertips badly blistered, and he shook his head in disgust at the fact that it had all been--theoretically, at least--so preventable.  Well.  Had got to make the best of it, hope to avoid trouble for a few days until the digits could begin healing and be restored to some of their former usefulness, but interested in knowing just how much he could expect of the hands in the meantime, he picked up a few stray willow wands that sat over against the wall, bending and coiling them, testing himself.  Results were rather disappointing, bandages interfering some but the hurt of his fingertips and his own shivering interfering more, and he soon set the willows down in frustration, huddling against the cold and making at last a concerted effort to allow himself to begin warming.

Liz seized the opportunity before it could pass, steering him over to the bed and spending the next hour sharing her own warmth as she tried to bring him back to something closer to a livable temperature, knowing it would begin falling again as soon as he hauled himself out of the bed and hoping he would consider it safe to have a fire, that coming night.  Until they did, he’d be expending all of his energy simply fighting to stay warm, and even if he wasn’t entirely willing to acknowledge the fact as of yet, she knew a large part of his problem revolved around the fact that, though he’d begun eating again, he was so far behind, nutritionally, and had been for so very long.  Does things to a person, no matter how well they’ve managed to adapt to and even in some measure thrive under the conditions, and she knew things would begin to get a bit easier for him, and for them, together, when he could begin to put on a bit of weight and step further back from the brink of starvation.  Speaking of which, she supposed she’d better be getting up and seeing about some lunch for the two of them, hungry herself and sure he must be the same, would be, at least, if he allowed himself to feel it, and surely would eat if presented with some leftover soup and a bit of chokecherry pudding.

Sunlight having shifted as the day went on, Liz opened the front door and allowed its rays to slant in all their golden fullness into the dark chill of the cabin, instantly adding a most welcome warmth and brightness to the place, and she spread the thick, warm mountain goat hide in the sunniest spot, where it gleamed white and reflected light up onto the ceiling, brightening the place even further.  Einar had by then left the bed, settling himself in his customary position between water barrel and wall, internal exile, self-imposed, but at Liz’s insistence he inched out partially into the sunlight, just letting it fall on one shoulder and part of a leg, as if needing to leave himself the option of retreating once more into the darkness.

Easing Will from the sling where he had spent much of the day riding close to her Liz laid him on the hide, only his face in shadow, thinking it would do him good to take in some sunlight.  Increasingly curious about the world around him with every passing day, the little one squirmed and wriggled and did his best to flip himself over onto his stomach, craning his neck and searching until his eyes settled on Einar, where they lingered for a long moment, curious, before continuing their appraisal of his newly sunlit surroundings.  Unable to take his own eyes off the child Einar scooted a bit nearer, finally allowing himself fully out into the sunlight where he started shivering all over again as it warmed stiff muscles and began working away at the ice that seemed to remain at his core.  Will, warm and very soon drowsy in the sunlight, dozed off within minutes, Liz glad to see it and glancing over at Einar, who sat nearby.

He was watching her, face grave but something approaching a smile in his eyes, and when she asked him what he was thinking, he shifted position, tucked his arms up against his body for warmth--was still pretty thoroughly chilled, uncertain of his ability to carry on an intelligible conversation through the shaking--and asked her if she remembered the time he’d told her how he knew they were having a son, a Snorri instead of a Hildegard.  She laughed, stretched out beside him in the sunlight.

“You always were set on the name ‘Snorri,’ weren’t you?  But yes, I remember exactly what you said, your dream of this cabin and him all dressed in buckskins and toddling across the tundra to meet you as you came back from hunting with a deer quarter slung over your shoulder…yes, I remember it.  Is that what you were thinking about?”

Einar nodded, smile spreading from eyes to face as he watched the sleeping child, so small and perfect and alive in the sunlight.  “He’ll probably be walking by the end of summer…”

Comments from 7 June

Anonymous said…

Do you know how this ends yet. Just curious.

Do any of us know exactly how life’s story ends for us, or when?  I should hope not…

Philip said... 

Chris, Such Power, to volunteer, to be dis-armed.

Einar, grasping at shadows fleeting by, every Fourth, Second, Sixth one, a Truth, the rest, a paranoia... AND reality, presented in his past.

How to Identify Truth, from reality... they ~are not~ always the same, Yes?

No, it seems they are not, and the distinction can apparently become pretty slippery at times.

Philip, thank you, as always, for your words.  God bless and keep you, my friend.




And now, an announcement.  I’m going away, up to the high country where it’s just me, the sharp-edged ridges and the wind in the trees, and I’ll be gone for a week or so, which means no more chapters during that time.  I am taking pen and notepad, though, so should have a chance to get some written for when I get back.

Thank you all for reading, for the comments and discussion.  It’s all appreciated.

7 June 2012

Still not easy to speak, half frozen as he was and besides greatly inclined to maintain his silence for a number of days after nights like that last one, but Einar was determined, and through a concentrated effort finally managed to get the words together so that they could be understood.

“Was…never any reason to think that was anything but…routine skiing accident and rescue, was there?”

“No, there wasn’t.”  Simple, direct; she did not try to soften the blow.

A nod.  Didn’t really change anything, his acknowledging having been in the wrong, but still he had to do it.  “Know that now.  Should have known it then.”

“Yes, I think you should have.”

“Pistol’s in…belt on pants.  Can’t get it.  Hands are no good.  You take it.”

Moving carefully, not wanting him to change his mind at the last minute without her having some warning of it, she took the weapon, set it aside.  Needed to look at his hands, get him inside and treat them for the frostbite she was sure he must have suffered in the night, but wasn’t certain he would let her, just yet.  Didn’t seem to be done.

“Knife too.  Take it.”

She wouldn’t.  “No.  I don’t want your knife.  This isn’t the answer, and besides, I know how antsy you get when you don’t have a weapon of one sort or another close to hand.  It’s not a good thing.”

“Neither is this.”

“No, it isn’t.”

“Don’t know what to do.”

“Neither do I.  We can talk about it later.”

Would have to talk about it, were a lot of things they had to talk about, but she could see he was in no state presently to be having that conversation, could barely get two or three words strung together and was going downhill fast, so instead she held him, wrapping herself around his slight form where he lay curled up in the parka--he wanted to get away from her, didn’t believe he had any right to her attentions, but there was nowhere to go, so he simply pressed his face into the ground, let the tears go unseen into the dirt--hating the feel of his bones through the layers of fur and hide, sharp, pressing, and wondering once again how he did it, day after day, how he went on like this.  Supposed he hardly did, really, and it wasn’t doing him any good lying there in the tunnel.  Wasn’t making any progress.  Needed warmth.

“Come on.”  She was lifting him.  “Let’s go inside.  Your hands need attention, and you’re freezing.  There’s no way you’re going to warm up out here all huddled in that parka with no additional source of heat.  Pardon my saying so, but you’re just too far gone, and it won’t work.  Your temperature’s too low, and you’ve got nothing left for your body to burn to make heat.  You’ll freeze to death, lying there.  Finish freezing to death.  It’s not a lot warmer inside, but I’ve got a candle going, and it helps a little.”

“But Will…”

“Will is your son.  Come inside.”

He went.  She was right.  The cold was killing him, and if he didn’t intend to let it finish the job in pretty short order, he’d got to do something differently, for a while.  Just a little while.  No longer than it took to get him thawed out just a bit, and then she’d surely kick him out again, or, if for some strange reason she did not, he would have to do the right thing and remove himself from the cabin.

Pot of lukewarm water in his lap, cold-reddened hands submerged up to the wrists and the rabbit hide blanket secured despite his objections around his shoulders--had believed, and not without some measure of truth, that by going on freezing he would be making things safer for everyone, but Liz had pointed out that such methods, though perhaps not without merit, simply weren’t conducive to restoring circulation and saving his hands, after which he’d allowed the blanket, but nothing more--Einar shivered against the water barrel, thawing.  His hands hurt.  Bad.  He welcomed the pain.  Knew from past experience that it helped keep things real, himself in the present where he needed to be, and that was a very good thing.  Figured he could probably justify remaining in the cabin with his family, so long as he had that insistent and irrepressible reminder to keep him tethered firmly to present realities, feet on the ground and with no doubt as to which way was up.

Hoped he wasn’t going to lose any fingers.  Hard to throw a dart, fire a rifle or run a trapline with your hands all bandaged and rotting, as his toes had been the year before.  Such injuries would be nothing short of disastrous, for a man who quite literally makes his living with his hands, hunting and foraging and constructing and fighting; he’d be quite lost without them.  Doubted things were going to get that bad.  Not the way he hurt.  Might be some damage, probably would be, after a night during which he had entirely neglected to monitor the state of his fingers while sitting stone-still in the snow and wind--what could you possibly have been thinking, Einar?  Really don’t know why you’re still alive, at this point--but continued numbness would have been a much worse sign.  Something was definitely alive in there, was screaming at him in its aliveness, and as Liz added a fresh round of lukewarm water to the pot--scalding him, felt as though it was scalding the flesh right off, but his eyes told him otherwise; stuff wasn’t even warm enough to be steaming in the cold cabin--he had to clamp his jaw to keep from screaming right along with it.  Managed to remain quiet, watching Liz with wide, staring eyes and wondering if she might be finding some justice in the hurt she was bringing him.  Knew that wasn’t the case.  She wasn’t like that, not at all, and for a moment he almost wished she might be.  Would have seemed right, in a way.  Definitely would have seemed right.

Instead, she finished feeding Will, laid him on the bed and sat down beside Einar with a pot of candle-warmed water, heavily sweetened with honey and thickened with lily root starch.  “Drink.”

He drank.

“You weren’t wrong, you know.”

He stared.

“I don’t want to be captured.  You know I don’t want that, for any of us.  And you weren’t wrong to have a plan to prevent that.  Problem is that you were ready to implement it over a couple of injured skiers, and that can’t be happening.  What are we going to do about that?”

“I’ll go away.  Stay up at…overlook, in the cliffs, give you two the cabin for awhile.”

“That’s not going to help things any, and besides, you wouldn’t make it out there.”

“I will.”

“Normally of course you would, the man who taught me most of what I know about getting by in the hills and timber, but right now…you wouldn’t last.  Einar, half the time you end up seriously hypothermic just sitting here in the cabin with a fire going, slipping away because you’re living so near the edge still that you can’t tell when you’re starting to slide over it, so surely you must see that you wouldn’t last the week out there, the way things are right now.  And even if you did, it’s not going to do anything for the real problem, here.  Not going to make things any better.  Please.  I want you to stay.  We can figure something out.”

“If  I stay…there are things I can do to make sure I stay…the way I should be around you two, but you’re going to have to let me do them, not try and stop me.”

“What sorts of things?”

His face darkened, didn’t want to speak of it, but already she had some idea, feared for him, but their options were looking awfully limited.

“Yes, of course I’ll let you.  Won’t interfere.”

He nodded.  Thankful.  Exhausted.   Yes.  Good.  Could work, and when she dragged over one of the bear hides and draped it over the two of them--time to get warm--he did not try to move away.

Comments from 6 June

Anonymous said... 

Maybe I can help with your understanding of Einar.

A long time ago, in a feted jungle far away, a young farm boy who was stupid enough to join the US Special Forces fought to save a fire base from which he had been schedule to stage through for a foray into Cambodia. The American hilltop fire bases of the time were defended by concentric rings of soldiers or Marians. If attacked the outer ring could fall back to the next ring if things went bad. Then the next, and so on. It was actually a fairly good strategy. The farm boy carried wounded defenders back to the next ring each time the unbelievable numbers of NVA regulars forced a fallback. Finally he carried a wounded soldier to an evack bird on the LZ. A medic looked at him, leaking badly from both legs and one arm, and a thousand piano wire cuts from NVA Chinese grenades, grabbed him by the flak jacket and pulled him aboard despite his objections.

As the slick fought for altitude he heard the fire base commander call “Broken Arrow” over guard channel. ‘Broken Arrow’ meant that an American unit was in danger of being overrun, and every American aircraft that could reach that unit should respond. It did not matter what ordinance the air craft was armed with. Napalm to depth charges, as long as it could be dropped on the heads of the enemy, it was welcome. Two gunships responded. An AC-130 specter and an AC-47 Puff. As the young Special Forces soldier lost consciousness from blood loss his last memory was of the fire base commander instructing the air assets to: “Fire on my position. We are being overrun!” For a quarter century the soldier suffered the unearned, completely undeserved, guilt of deserting his friends in their time of need. 

Twenty five years later he, totally by chance, encountered one of the men left behind at that fire base. And was told that the garrison was saved, when they hunkered down under sand bags in bunkers and let the air assets do their job. Over 150 men whom he had thought were overrun and killed had been saved!

The guilt was never assuaged. It stays with him to this day. The remnants of battle are not always logical.

Mike


Mike, thank you.  Please tell that farm boy that Einar has some idea how rough it is to be pulled out of a fight when you think you’re not done yet, when you haven’t done all you could do, even if that thinking is in error.  And that he knows how it is to go for years blaming one’s self for not finishing the job, and for all the perceived consequences that followed after.  And tell him also that I’m sitting here with tears in my eyes, so glad for him that he finally found out what happened up there on his hill, and that I doubt it was by chance he encountered the man who let him know.

Kellie said… 

I thank you for your insight.

I actually have an understanding of my own experiences when it comes to this subject. And that may be exactly why I have this love hate relationship with Einar, he is too much like me...?

But I will no longer comment on it since the one time I did barely begin to make comments, I was soundly thrashed for my own view and experiences, despite the fact that I never actually was allowed to completely explain myself and the fact that they (the thrashers) completely did not comprehend what I was saying.

It seems that some men do not understand that women also go to war.

Kellie, I understand that women also go to war.  Everyone has their own struggles, and I for one don’t believe you necessarily have to be engaged in firefights on foreign soil in order to be a warrior, or to be wounded.  Everyone’s experience is different, and if I wasn’t there where you were, I really can’t judge yours anymore than you can mine.

I’m sorry if you believe people have criticized you here for what you said about your own experiences.  I don’t remember that happening, though if you say it did, I believe you.  What I do remember is a spirited debate on the subject of pacifism, and people, me among them, defending their points of view from what they perhaps wrongly believed to be an attack.

I’ve never censored you--or anyone else for that matter--nor would I, so if you weren’t allowed to completely explain yourself on that matter or any other, it may be because you didn’t allow yourself to finish explaining.

So, comment or don’t, as you prefer, but if choose not to, don’t let it be because of anything I have said and done, because I value everyone’s perspective.

6 June 2012

Moving slowly and with an uncertainty that soon had Liz thinking she might have been doing better to simply go ahead and push him over the cliff where at least he would have been cushioned somewhat by the deep snow and instantly close to home, Einar shuffled his way back into the timber there on the overlook, following Liz.  The bear hide and soup pot, she had pushed over.  No way she could hope to both carry them and assist Einar, who despite starting out well, made slow progress that all but came to a halt upon reaching the steep descent to the cabin.  Couldn’t trust himself not to fall in his clumsiness, and with Liz there below him, feared scraping her off the descent with him, when he went.  So he stopped.  Quit right there in the middle of the path and sat down, pressing himself into the snow and meaning to wait there until she’d finished making her own way down and was in the clear.  Which of course she did not do, having no intention of leaving him and thinking his reason for stopping to have more to do with simple exhaustion, cold and a physical inability to continue than anything else, she returned to his side, did her best to get him back on his feet.

He couldn’t tell her, made vague gestures with his hands in the hopes she might understand and somehow she did, inching her way up above him on the steepness and allowing him to go on ahead where his fall would impact no one but himself.  Good, the way it should be, and he started moving again, stumbling his way down those steep, icy rocks with a reckless abandon that made Liz cringe and hold her breath and ultimately look away, lest she lose her own footing with the intensity of watching it.

Down at last, both of them, Einar in the snow on his knees beneath the firs, unable or unwilling to go further just then and she took his arm, hauled him insistently to his feet, seeing that he was near the end and not willing to lose him then, so close to home.  Knew she might well end up doing so anyway, for he was, despite his occasional assertions to the contrary, not wholly immune to the effects of the cold, was human and was badly starved and had just spent a very long night out in the weather not making even the least effort to shield himself from its effects.  And they couldn’t have a fire.

None of these things were in Einar’s mind as he allowed Liz once more to get him to his feet, helping how he could and point his path towards home.  He was thinking only that he had no right to go home, none at all and belonged, if anywhere, still up in the snowy heights where he had passed the night, but he had even less right to contradict her, and she wanted him at home.  So he kept moving, and then there they were, tunnel opening black and welcoming before them, morning breeze ceasing in its sharpness and chill as soon as they’d crawled their way in, and Einar rolled himself up against its wall and was still, exhausted, unbelieving when Liz held the door and beckoned him inside, but he couldn’t do it, could not share a space with them just now, turned to the wall and closed his eyes.

Liz went inside.  Had to get Will fed and herself eating some breakfast so she could continue reliably to produce the food upon which the little one depended, and if Einar really wanted to stay out in the tunnel and finish dying—her attitude towards him had shifted just a bit upon actually reaching home once more—then perhaps that was his business, and he ought to be left to it.  Which of course she did not really mean, shaking her head the next moment at the horror of it and hurrying to get Will his breakfast so she could go out and see what she might do for him.  Not much, for he’d already done it himself, shedding snow-encrusted pants, boots and gloves and curling up inside his parka in an impossibly small, heat-conserving ball where he lay doing his best to shiver himself warm again, repulsed by the idea that Liz might feel any obligation to help with the process when by all rights she ought to be kicking him out in the snow to face his fate.
                  
Despite his efforts, things weren’t going too well.  Simply possessed no energy with which to fight it, the chill that had hold of him, and even his shivering was a feeble effort that soon tapered off and left him once more still in the silence of the tunnel, drifting down and with no terribly strong motivation to fight it.

Liz was glad to see that he’d made some effort to help himself begin warming; it was more than he would have done a week or two prior, and done that morning without her prompting and despite the circumstances, she took it as a sign of hope.  Saw that he could use some help though, if things were to continue heading in the right direction.  Sat down beside him.  Will was inside, warm in his bed of furs, having finished eating and gone back to sleep.

“Brought you some tea.  Lots of honey to help you get your energy back, and I warmed it over a candle so it’s not quite so cold as it would have been…”

No answer.  Kept his face to the wall.  She needed to go back in there with Will, leave him be.  He couldn’t understand her persistence.  Not on this matter, not after what he’d done.  Been about to do.  He knew that she knew.  Must know.  He’d seen it in her eyes, the recognition, the moment of terror and the intent to step in and stop him, drop him in his tracks, hated that he had been the one to put it there.  And he’d probably been wrong from the start about the nature and severity of the threat, too.  Could see it now, with what was left of his capacity for rational thought after all that time out in the cold, seeing far more clearly than he had at the time--could be you should spend a lot more of your nights freezing on the edges of cliffs; seems to do you some good, but it wasn’t funny.  Nothing was funny, anymore--and knowing he had to find a way to tell her.

Normally, his pride might have interfered a bit when it came to admitting such a thing, allowing for the fact that not only had he been wrong about a specific situation, but that his judgment had been seriously flawed, having little relation to reality.  But none of that mattered, now.  Only thing that hindered him at the moment was the fact that despite wanting very badly to tell her these things, he couldn’t see to so much as get his brain to get his body working on turning over.  Well.  Probably best that way.  He’d just mess up the telling, most likely, and besides, none of it would change who he was or what he was or the thing he’d just done.  Probably best for everyone if he stayed as he was, face to the wall for a little time more, until it was over.  Only, he was wrong about that, and knew it.  Even if he never slept in the cabin again, lived up in the cliffs for the next twenty years trapping rabbits and squirrels and leaving them on her doorstep in the dead of night, even if that was how it had to be, he had a duty to that woman and to the child they shared, and much as he might have liked to justify the train of thought which had been and was leading him in that direction, his duty and its fulfillment must come first.  Which meant sticking around, and he turned, suddenly finding himself able, though not moving well at all, and met her eye.

Comments from 5 June

Kellie said… 

Don't forget the soup and bear hide!!!! 

I have a very strong love hate relationship with this story! 
;)

The part where you love and admire Liz, but hate Einar for being a stubborn old mule, and such?

Anyhow, thanks for reading…  :)

Anonymous said...

Liz has already expressed her own desire for death before capture. The real moral dilemma is the welfare of an innocent child. While except in extremely unusual circumstances it is a crime against God to remove a child from the nurture of his natural and loving parents; we all know that if the family is captured they will be split up and attempts will be made to use them against one another. Despicable but inevitable. Were I Einar and Liz I would be moving plans to provide for a last stand way up on the priority list. Unlike Bonny & Clyde, or Butch & Sundance, last stands don’t always end in disaster. Hope springs eternal. But they need to plan for Broken Arrow. 

They need to provide an inner keep for Will. A sturdy fur lined stone enclosure that will stop bullets and other flying objects. They need to designate to whom guardianship will pass in the event of their deaths or incapacitation; surly Liz has some family somewhere willing to take the infant unannounced. They need to each sit down and write Will a long letter so that he does not lose his heritage and thereby himself. These documents I would very carefully cash in a very safe place known only to Bud and Susan. If Liz and Einar become killed or captured they should be sent anonymously along with a generous retainer to an honest dependable attorney with no past connections to any of the principles. The attorney’s client would be Will’s mother, dead or alive. 

It’s not perfect, but at least it’s a plan. More than they have now. And they need one to get past the dark uncertainty looming over their heads now. 

Mike

Wow, a lot to think about there, some things that might work and some that might not, and I guess they ought to be thinking along those lines, given the situation and its unpredictable nature.

Anonymous said…
Some very interesting reading since I was last here... Moved into ~The Lodge~ Sunday, and interestingly enough, it took doing that to Finally power my desk top computer via 12VDC inverter and Deep Cycle style battery. 

works great on a 400 Watt inverter.... for some reason I have no ~store bought power~ what Jenny & I called power from a Utility Company... I got my acct set up, the power was never "off" just changed names, but No Store bought in the house!
M<e, I just got back from 3 days of JOY at Roseburg VAMC, prep for day 1, then Colonoscopy day 2, and hang around till the ~meds wear off~ which takes me to this day!

I downloaded and read all up to June 5.... that Einar, what ~are~ we ~going~ to with him???

I have know Mules that had less stubbornness, I have (viz.: Frugal's old man icon there)!!!!

me, I am tired, have not had good sleep for three days.... much like Einar, only I have a body tempeture near ~regular~ live human sort of, cold feet, but ten toes.....I will have them under flannel blanket after I send this, and nod off! 
;-)
philip

Philip, glad you’re getting all settled in the new place--and good thing you have the alternative power, until that gets all sorted out!

Your visit to the VAMC sounds…uh…unpleasant, at best--ought to know better than to let those folks get their hands on you!  Works for me! But glad that’s over with, and you’re home.  And at least you do still have ten toes!  That's always a good thing.

5 June 2012

Taking the pistol Bud Kilgore had left or him but leaving everything else, Einar retreated to the tunnel without a word, a long, lingering look at Will on his way out, but he couldn’t meet Liz’s eye, and she was afraid for him, but made no move to prevent his departure.  Wanted to be alone and figured he probably did, too; best that way, at least for a while.  It was the only thing for them to do; if he hadn’t left, she would have had to.  She didn’t start a fire.  Had intended to go without for a day or two after the departure of the rescuers, anyway, just to be safe and make sure they had no intention of returning, and had no reason to change her plans now.  Besides, she hated to think of Einar sitting out there and seeing the smoke, knew what it would mean to him.  If he was even in a place where he could have seen it.  She didn’t know where he had gone.  Had left the tunnel some time ago, of that she was sure, his need to put some distance between the two of them apparently growing greater than his fear of leaving tracks, but she knew that wherever he had gone, his route would involve heavy timber, concealment surely remaining highest priority, no matter his state of mind.  Some habits simply don’t fade, regardless of the circumstances.

Silence in the cabin, and only when Will made a noise, stirring and whimpering in her arms, did she realize how intently she had been listening, straining her ears in the silence, and she took a deep breath, turned her attention to the little one…

It was getting dark.  She lit a candle.  Figured they could afford a candle, a single candle, and the darkness was becoming terribly oppressive, the aloneness there in the cabin, the silence.  Will was asleep again.  She half wished he would wake, so she could talk to him.  Which was silly.  He couldn’t answer.  Couldn’t carry on a conversation, not yet, and it was conversation she really wanted.  But Einar was gone, and she wanted him to stay that way.  At least for the moment.  Until she’d had a little time to think things through.  Better get started thinking, then.  It was cold out there, and he hadn’t taken much of anything with him.

Darkness was near complete.  Windy outside, and Liz sat listening to its howling against the walls, scouring of wind-driven snow as it was lifted from the ground and hurled against the timbers.  She shivered.  Wanted him gone, but didn’t want him dead, and though he certainly knew how to take care of himself out there, she had little confidence that he possessed either the will or the strength to do so, that night.  Warmed some soup over the candle, wrapped the pot in a fur to keep it warm, folded up the smaller of the two bear hides and slid Will into the carrying pouch at the back of her parka, went to find him.

He’d gone up the cliffs, up there where he could overlook the cabin, wanting to watch it, she supposed, to watch for the enemy or for her or maybe for both, and she followed him, boots in his tracks where they stumbled stricken and crooked up through the timber, slumping to his knees now and then but always rising again, climbing the precarious, icy rocks, surprisingly sure-footed once he’d got into the really difficult stuff.  He always had been good at the really difficult stuff.  The top.  A bit lighter up there; less timber, and there he was, all hunched up at the edge of the cliff, just far enough from its lip to avoid crunching through the bit of icy snow that clung there and going down, but not so far that it would be any great surprise should he slide those extra few inches and take a fall.  Figured he probably wanted it that way.  She sat down at a safe distance, spoke to him.

No response, nothing, no sign that he was even aware of her presence.  Might as well have been made of stone.  He wasn’t even shivering, though she expected he must have been, earlier.  Not a good sign, but what could she do?  She left the soup and the hide within his reach, pushing them out carefully there to the brink of the cliff with him, returned the way she had come and made ready for the night.  She did not sleep much, still listening, tears flowing after a while as she poured out her prayer for him, wordless, for she did not know what to say.

Einar’s self-imposed exile continued through the night as he sat up there in the cliffs, and she went to him the next morning, once more following his tracks through the snow, half afraid that she would find him to have frozen in the night.

Which she did not.  Should have known.  He was an awfully sturdy fellow in a lot of ways and had certainly been through worse, was still upright and, though she had her doubts at first, still breathing, though it appeared he hadn’t moved an inch since first taking his seat up there in the snow.  Not only was the surrounding ground undisturbed, no sign of the shuffling and stomping that would have been necessary to keep him even marginally warm through the night, but the wind had blown a thin skiff of snow up and over his boots, coating pants and parka with white where he sat with arms around his knees, unmoving.  She crouched beside him, tried to catch his eye.

“I want you to come back inside with us.”

Took him a long time to respond, brain all slow and sluggish, voice coming cracked and hollow from somewhere very deep inside him.  “No…can’t do that.”

His face was pale, purple, haggard, eyes red-rimmed as if he hadn’t slept at all and mouth a thin white slash, grim, set, pained but stoic, in it for the long haul; looked bad.  He hadn’t touched the food she’d left him; soup was frozen solid in its pot, bear hide remaining folded neatly beneath it.

“You haven’t been eating.”  Stating the obvious; not much else to say.  “It’s cold.  You’re going to die.”

He nodded.  Didn’t even bother disputing it as he normally would have done, the sincere objections of no, I’m fine, would take a lot more than this to freeze me solid, I like the cold, need the cold, thrive in it, where’s the tarn?  I want to go for a swim!  No point in pretense, now.  In pretending.  He lacked the heart for it.

“Or.” she went on, wanting to scare him, jolt him, reach him and get some sort of reaction,  “you’ll live, and lose the rest of your toes.  Or your hands.  Or both.”

Yes, probably both.

“Come inside.  I want you with us.  I want you to live.”

No answer.  He didn’t have any answer for that.  Wished she would go away, for he could not face her.  She did not go.  Inched closer, and he shifted a boot, sending a shower of ice and snow into the emptiness below.  She didn’t want to push he luck.

“Just to the tunnel, then.  Come to the tunnel, where you’ll be out of the wind.”  Will was waking, squirming and demanding his breakfast, but she couldn’t tend to him just then.  Einar heard, head on his knees as he listened to the soft, alive sounds of his son greeting the day, and he didn’t know what to do.

“Maybe…tunnel.”

He would have fallen, would have surely toppled forward over the edge had he tried to stand just then, and she could see it, crept up close behind him, talking all the while so as not to take him by surprise, and took him beneath the arms, hauled him back away from the abyss, inch at a time until he was on more stable ground and could rise without too much danger, helped him to his feet.

“Let’s go home.”